Research Rabbit Hole: hairpins and coming out

Allan Bérubé describes how a baby gay would “drop hairpins” or hints to let other queer people know they were gay.

Maybe they’d discuss a fondness for the Wizard of Oz, or sensible shoes, or the 1940s Chappell Roan herself Marlene Dietrich. In fact, army base “music rooms” were often a kind of queer cruising ground. You’d sit in there, listening to records and eyeing up the cute thing in the chair opposite.